The Guardian
Mark Sweney
28 March 2025
Airlines could face higher charges to help fund new system at airport, which was shut down by substation fire
The chief executive of Heathrow has said it could cost about £1bn to install a more resilient power supply system to prevent a repeat of the outage that shut Europe’s busiest airport last week, and that airlines could pay higher charges to help fund it.
The disruption last Friday, caused by a fire at a nearby electricity substation, led to the cancellation of 1,300 flights and affected more than 200,000 passengers around the world.
John Pettigrew, the chief executive of National Grid, has claimed there was enough power available from two other substations near Heathrow to have allowed it to remain open during the shutdown period.
Woldbye maintains the airport had no choice but to close on safety grounds but suggested it might have been able to switch over its systems more quickly and reopened sooner.
